Toll plaza shooter gets death penalty

Nathan Burris, 49, was sentenced to death Tuesday in Contra Costa County Superior Court in Martinez for the double murder of Deborah Ann Ross, 51, and Ersie “Chuckie” Everette Jr., 58.

For the families of the victims, the sentence brought to an end weeks of listening to taunts from the man who killed their loved ones in the 2009 shooting on the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge.

Burris and Ross had been living together in Richmond prior to the slaying. Ross’s family members say that Ross had recently ended their 13-year relationship and was planning on moving in with one of her sisters when Burris killed her.

Throughout the trial, Burris represented himself and when he called his only witness for his defense—himself—he used the time on the stand to detail his exact moves on August 11, 2009.

“When you’re going on a mission like I was going on, you want to be successful,” Burris told the jury as he used magnets on the white board behind the stand to show them where he parked his car in the toll plaza parking lot and how he planned it out.